I had just died. About a month had passed since my death. No one cared about anyone else there. Every day they would say, “Tomorrow, we will deal with your case.”
I was tired of this uncertainty. It wasn’t just me; there were thousands like me there. The place where we were held resembled a camp. I didn’t know why they were keeping us there. Sometimes when our numbers increased in the camp, they would take some people away in trucks and bring in another group in their place.
In the evenings, the atmosphere in the camp became very gloomy. They would come and line us up. Several people would take a count. We were instructed to stand up and sit down multiple times. Then, they would tell everyone to sit in their designated spot and not move until told otherwise. We would sit there on the ground.
Except for Fridays, this ceremony took place every day. During this routine, they would usually bring a man whom I felt I had seen somewhere before. But not once did they announce his name. His hands and feet were bound with chains. They would take him to a high place, lie him on a bench face down, and tie his entire body to the bench with ropes to prevent him from moving when whipped.
A large-sized figure would arrive; I wasn’t sure if it was a human, a spirit, an angel, or what. While swinging a whip around its hands, it would stand next to the bench for a few moments. Every day, the verdict of that man was broadcast over the camp loudspeakers.
On even days, when his sentence was read, they would say he committed rape, and on odd days, they would claim he raped children.
Silence would envelop everywhere. Everyone held their breath. Now, the whipping ceremony began. We were forced to count the lashes out loud. Every day, a hundred lashes with the utmost intensity were inflicted on his body. With each lash, the man would let out a scream and would faint by the tenth lash, showing no move until the end. When the ceremony was over, they would take his body away on the bench which he was tied to. The next day, he would come back on his own feet.
One of the people who slept next to me in the camp at nights, who seemed like a good person, told me, based on what one of the camp’s deputies—a person he had befriended—said: The man who was whipped every day had never even cast a glance at a woman in his entire life.
I asked, then why is this injustice done to him every day?
He said, the deputy of the camp told him that the man was the ruler of a country where rape and child molestation had become common, and he had not taken any measures to prevent or counteract these horrific crimes and had no plans regarding this matter.
I asked him, what is the name of that man? He said he didn’t know.
Maybe he knew and just didn’t want to tell me!
Mohammad Mahdavifar
Deminer and Diver of the Sacred Defense
29th of Farvardin 1395 [April 17, 2016]